[ RadSafe ] Drawing the line... /Sternglass

[Bjorn Cedervall]

Professor Bo Lindell (earlier head of the Swedish Radiation Protection Authority and also key member of the ICRP) wrote together with Sven Löfveberg a book (in Swedish, 446 pages) in the early 70:ies called "Nuclear Power, Man and Radiation Safety" (my free translation). This book includes at least around 15 pages relating to the works by Dr. Sternglass (partly this coverage because of the wide publicity the "scary stuff" had caused).
 
It is not possible to briefly cover all this but essentially the topic is about statistical fishing expeditions (chosing time periods, geography and so on) to get the scary results. Much of this was about deaths of newborn children. I will just give one example from the book which relates to a presentation (death of newborns near Indian Point) Sternglass had at The Nordic Society for Radiation Protection in Copenhagen in 1971. When asked why he didn't correlate the radioactive releases to the air taking the predominant wind direction with the "effect" the answer was essentially that he then didn't get as good correlation (most of the release BTW was into the Hudson River if I recall correctly). The child mortality went down in the area in 1968-1969 but the the releases didn't decrease. There was some strange excuse for that as well. This is enough for me. Lindell and Löfveberg continue to analyze the methodology of Sternglass (which is hypothesis generating - the hypothesis comes afterwards...) and name the phenomenon "Sternglass Effect".
 
Actually all this ought to be translated into English down to the details - it is so illuminating and we need to put this part of the circus behind us. Obviously and unfortunately this level of research has gone right into the Tooth Fairy stuff. No wonder Christie Brinkley et al. provide great help as distractors.
 
My personal ideas only,
 
Bjorn Cedervall
PS. As some of you notice I haven't been here for a while - I simply have had too much to do and must admit that there are over 13 000 unread emails in this Inbox.
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> Date: Wed, 5 Oct 2011 16:40:56 +0100
> From: C.Busby at ulster.ac.uk
> To: radsafe at agni.phys.iit.edu; radsafe at agni.phys.iit.edu
> Subject: Re: [ RadSafe ] Drawing the line between science and pseudo-science. (was Rational Thought)
> 
> Steven Dapra takes some time to attack me. 
> But talking about creationism, I believe that Steven Dapra is a Creationist. Is that right, Steven?
> And dont knock Sternglass. His work is broadly correct. 
> Chris
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: radsafe-bounces at agni.phys.iit.edu on behalf of Harrison, Tony
> Sent: Wed 05/10/2011 15:02
> To: radsafe at health.phys.iit.edu
> Subject: [ RadSafe ] Drawing the line between science and pseudo-science. (was Rational Thought)
> 
> Interesting blog here:
> 
> http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/doing-good-science/2011/10/04/drawing-the-line-between-science-and-pseudo-science/
> 
> The example given is the debate between evolution and "creation science" but the arguments apply just as much to anti- (or pro-) nuke opinions. Take a moment to think about what sort of evidence it would take to convince you that your beliefs are false, and then see if such evidence exists.
> 
> Busby's citation of Sternglass et alia is laughable, but so are some of the pro-hormesis papers cited here over the years. Both just show that the peer-review process is far from perfect. Too many propagandists out there, and not enough scientists.
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